Reading reflection

One of the most surprising things to me was Steve jobs off putting personality. It seems that at a young age he wasn’t much of a team player in being able to work well with others. It can e noticed specifically when he got the job with Atari and his coworkers gravitated away from him. 

One of the things I admired about Steve jobs was his adopted parents constant support. At a young age, they realized his creativeness and understood that it was more so misguided energy being displaced. Other than the drugs that he experimented with, they enabled me helped him foster his inner creativity into different productive projects. 

One thing that I admired the least, would be the mannerism of which he handled his first child and dismissing that it was even his child. I understand the reasoning behind it but when you look at the evidence that was presented, he was in the wrong of which he later admitted. 

Steve Jobs is one who encountered several different adversity and trials during his life. One of the first ones is the fact that his parents gave him up for adoption of and dealing with that built up anger and confusion. The other major one was him dropping out of college. As a result of entire to Atari and camped out till he got a job. Another is him going to India and embarking on a spiritual journey. So through his times of adversity he has overcome them through perseverance and outside of the box thinking.

One of the biggest competencies is his will to persevere and find another means of his situation. He was able to get a job although being a college dropout.  Moreover, he was able to secure the investment money needed to start up his company in producing Apple computers when the other Steve wanted to give it away for free. 

One part of the reading that was confusing to me was the part about his behavioral tendencies that seemed to plague him throughout his career. It seemed to be a recurring thing to the point he got demoted in his own company.

Two question that I would ask is, how did the reality distorting field come about? The other would be how were you able to capitalize on your shortcomings. These questions are important in relation to how your able to willfully enable others around you to help you in your success. 

I think his opinion of hard work is that it was absolutely necessary. Especially from his story and how he came about to get to where he is has been nothing short of believing in himself and making opportunities when there aren’t.

Buyer behavior

The segment that I chose was university of Florida students who are pre health. I interviewed a senior in undergraduate, a sophomore as well as a freshman in medical school. 

The overall consensus I received when conducting the interviews was that the education they received prior to college was test centric and they ultimately felt behind in college.  The sophomore in undergraduate is a chemistry major who stated that, although she took AP chem in high school, she still had to take intro to chem here at the university. The senior in undergrad also stated the lack of information.  The biggest thing she stated was the lack of teachings in non subject areas so how to manage money and navigating her undergrad years to get her where she wants to be.  She felt as if the other tangibles like balancing a checkbook or loan and credit card debt would’ve been vital. Lastly, the freshman in medical school says that she went to both public and private school and the difference in educational standards. She says that the lack of restrictions amongst private schools  the better education, more so than the other amenities it came with.

The first thing that they do when they realize the gap of education is they try to compensate through a variety of resources. Some of these include, study edge, smoking notes, tutoring, and other on campus resources.  When it come stop non academic learning, they use peers, mentors, as well as other organizations alongside the internet.

I have found that, the gap is also becoming greater as the next class comes in. This is a result of the school systems being more test centric and restricting freedom from the curriculum. It is damaging because the students feel as if they aren’t learning much life skills, let alone learning the academic curriculum effectively.

Napkin

My talents aren’t necessarily tangible but more so able to read people and different situations. More so, coming from such an impoverished background, I value the importance of not only a quality education but one that extends beyond the classroom. This goes into not Teaching students test taking skills but also skills to be full functioning adults and how to obtain wealth beyond a 9-5.  However, as previously stated, this can only be attainable with more freedom within public schooling. This is why I propose to change the focus on passing the EOC and other standardized tests to allow for such freedom.  As a result, I’m proposing that we change the curriculum for teaching standards, to include life skills. This new curriculum will allow teachers to deviate and allow flexibility. This opportunity would be proposed to the Florida governor first and foremost, as he is the one over standardized tests in Florida.  The most prominent outcome for this would be the increase in not only test scores like SAT/ACT but also a rise in college readiness. I believe that I am competent enough since I have been educated in three different countries and have a basis to compare. These elements fit together in helping look at the product 360.

Testing part 2

Yes I do believe that, there were differences amongst the types of people I interviewed. I kept the same group, although they were different people. The group that I kept were students, teacher, parent, college administrator, and professor. I would say that the college administrator , would be the group outside looking in. Upon, interview it came to my conclusion, that the college administrator  were the ones that slightly opposed the idea compared to the others.  The reasoning I received was that it would disturb the system they had in place for differentiating amongst students being let into universities. This was fostering the competitive nature of our education within the states in that each school wants the best and brightest instead of fostering an education to make each student the best and brightest.  The need Identified differs from another when the goal shifts. The goal of this need and opportunity differs in that the focus is to improve the quality education students are receiving more so than the improving the statistics of of us education which would come altogether. Moreover, I would say the outsiders need is different than he other ones inside due to the fact the college administrator is more worried about being the best in college rankings, while the others are focused on the individual learning of the student.

Student, teacher, professor, parent	College administrator
Better education system	More competitive students
Florida ranks near the bottom when it comes to state k-12 grade schools, approximately 48.  Moreover, the US is near the lower middle when it comes to the world.	More tests, different programs to further the gap between various students,

Solving opportunity

The opportunity I came up with last time was in reference to the public education system in the state of Florida which would then be broadly implemented in the US, if successful. I would say that we take a page from the Finland. One of the first things to note is that Finland's education system has somewhat of a community based approach. First and foremost, the difference between the weakest and strongest are said to be the smallest in the world.  One of those reasons, is that there is no difference between the classroom structure in terms of knowledge. Moreover, the science based classes are smaller in an effort to allow for more hands on learning. There are several other, however, my approach would be to broaden the current standardized tests in an effort to allow more flexibility for teachers in grade school.  Additionally the standardized test would be taken 2x in high school to allow ample time to learn and review the material. The exam would be more of a progression measuring exam then it would be "intelligence"

Florida Schooling

Public High school students aren't able to fully thrive to be able to compete due to the new standardized tests for each course subject in Florida. 

The Who: public high school students 

The what: aren't able to fully thrive or prepare for college 

The why: teaching curriculums are focused to be able to pass course exams

After talking with 5 individuals it can be summarized that The Who does not only pertain to high school students. 2 out of the 5 people I interviewed were high school professors and they stated how limiting and lack of control they have with the curriculum. They also compared it to what they learned when they were in high school compared to what they have to teach now and it is not on the same level. I also talked to a parent who noticed the same thing when she helps her children do homework. Also spoke to a college professor who said that she notices the variety in education amongst students who went to certain schools. Lastly, after speaking to 2'students they also stated that they aren't learning as much as they used to. They stated that they can see the comparison as well amongst out of state students as well as those who went to private school.  Moreover, it can be assumed that this might extend earlier than high school but rather into middle school and elementary eventually. 

Furthermore after speaking to the 5 individuals, primarily the professors, it has come to my attention that there are some material that was completely new to students. So the goal of the standardized tests was to boost, the education levels for an abundant amount of schools that were below reading and comprehension levels for their grades. However, it is harping on concepts that most individuals were doing before. As a result, I do feel like there needs to be an updated system, to better counter balance the lower education level. This can be noticed also as Florida currently ranks number #46 from K-12. 

Opportunities

The first is that baby boomers, aren't retiring. I found the first opportunity on business insider. An opportunity exists because it is something that is affecting a lot of millennials in their career path. The prototypical customers would be either millennials looking to join the workforce and employers. It is going to be relatively difficult to exploit because of the number of the high percentage.  What leads me to believing there is an opportunity is my experience with volunteering at a nursing home. Moreover, my last job I worked, was with a few elders who were close to retiring and gave me some keen advice.

The next opportunity is the global productivity paradox. I found this opportunity while searching on what economic trends are.  The prototypical customer would be anybody in the workforce or trying to get in. The paradox ultimately states that the world is getting more technologically advance although productivity is going down. It's going to be relatively difficult because of the society we live in. What leads me to this opportunity is my work experience which has allowed , me to realize the need for a 50/50 between manual labor and technology. 

The next opportunity is of tax policy changes. Under the new tax form a few states are revamping the tax codes to comply with federal policy. The prototypical customer would be mostly small business owners. This would be somewhat difficult to implement due to the uncertainty in knowing when the tax would take full effect. However upon further reading, this can be highly beneficial for small business owners and entrepreneurs. What leads me to seeing this opportunity is the fact that I grew up in a neighborhood with a lot of small business owners and side hustles. 

The next opportunity would be portable benefits. I found this on the same website as the the previous business news daily. The prototypical customer for this would be employees who frequent change careers, or may looking to change jobs. This would somewhat be difficult as it would require cooperation amongst different companies. This ties back in with the fact that I used to volunteer with elders who frequented different jobs.